THE NEW RESOLVENEHEMIAH – LESSON 10
Lesson 10
The New Resolve
BYRAY C. STEDMAN
THE NEW RESOLVENEHEMIAH – LESSON 10
"All Scripture" says the Apostle Paul in hissecond letter to Timothy, "is inspired [breathed-out] by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof,for correction, for training in righteousness" (2Timothy 3:16 RSV). All of Scripture, therefore,has practical application to our lives today. All ofit, whether it be a list of names as dry as dust, or abeautiful display of poetry from one of the psalmsor the prophets, it all has great value for us.
Perhaps we have felt this as we have beenstudying through the book of Nehemiah together.We have been tracing in this book the steps torecovery from spiritual ruin or damage:
The first seven chapters tell the story of therebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem. This teachesus how to restore our defenses — how to rebuildthe walls and the gates of our lives — to close thegaps where the enemy has been getting at us, eitherthrough some outward practice or an inwardattitude that has been destructive and damaging inour relationships with others.
Then, beginning with Chapter 8 and onthrough the middle section of the book, we havebeen looking at the need for a change of outlook:How to renew our minds, to be reinstructed in thetruth, to correct our thinking so we begin to thinkas God thinks. That involves a careful hearing ofthe Word of God. Remember the great scene of allIsrael standing before the Water Gate and listening,hour after hour, to the reading of the Scripture. Thatis what changed that nation.
As we apply this to our own lives, it also involves,as it did for them, acknowledging our past errorand failure and confessing to God and praising himfor his wonderful goodness.
That brings us to the natural outcome of this,which is commitment to a new lifestyle. We findthis in Chapter 10, though it actually begins withthe closing verse of Chapter 9:
In view of all this, [i.e., their confession andpraise of God] we are making a bindingagreement, putting it in writing, and ourleaders, our Levites and our priests are affixingtheir seals to it. (Nehemiah 9:38 NIV)
This is a wonderful display of the need whichmany people feel to put into verbal form the newdirections they want to take in life. There followshere a list of the signers of this new covenant, ornew agreement, that Israel is making. They fall intofour groups, who are identified for us in a ratherintimidating list of names. (I do not propose toread them all. I suggest that if you have a newbornson in your home, you may want to look throughthis list and pick out a name for him. Perhaps aname like Shebaniah or Hashabiah will make himdistinguished among his peers!)
First of all Nehemiah himself, the governor,signs this, and with him a company of the priestswhose names are given. Then a group of Levites,those who serve the temple, sign this agreement.Then there is a group of the leaders, the rulers ornobles of the land, who sign it. Finally, in Verses 28-29, we have the common people. I propose to lookat this paragraph in detail.
The rest of the people—priests, Levites,gatekeepers, singers, temple servants and allwho separated themselves from the neighboringpeoples for the sake of the Law of God, togetherwith their wives and all their sons and daughterswho are able to understand—all these now jointheir brothers the nobles, and bind themselves
THE NEW RESOLVENEHEMIAH – LESSON 10
with a curse and an oath to follow the Lawof God given through Moses the servant ofGod and to obey carefully all the commands,regulations and decrees of the LORD our Lord.(Nehemiah 10:28-29 NIV)
That is a list of what might be termed thecompany of the committed. These people see a needfor preserving and perpetuating the changes in theirlifestyles so as to keep in step with God; thus theysign this agreement to bind themselves to that end.This agreement represents a kind of universal urgefound among humans to publicly and seriouslypledge themselves to be loyal to a cause they feel isright. There are many instances of this recorded inhistory. For instance:
When the Pilgrims were about to land atPlymouth, they formed what they called theMayflower Compact. They drew up rules for living inthe new land and they all signed it as an agreementto live by these principles and laws.
Probably the most famous documentin American history is the Declaration ofIndependence. Our forefathers signed that greatstatement setting forth the reasons why they feltGod was leading them to establish a new nationupon this continent. Recall the closing words ofthat document:
...for the support of this Declaration, with a firmreliance on the protection of divine Providence,we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, ourFortunes and our sacred Honor.
History records that most of those signers ofthe Declaration actually did have to give up theirlives. Those who did not lost their fortunes. But allof them retained their sacred honor. Perhaps youhave done something like that in your own life.There came a time when you realized you neededto make some changes in your behavior. Some ofthe greatest saints of the past did this. They drew upfor themselves rules for their own conduct practicesthey felt would help them to walk with God and togrow in grace and favor before him.
I was reading the life of Abraham Lincoln notlong ago, and was interested to read that in 1862, atthe very height of the Civil War, Lincoln said to hiscabinet:
"When the rebel army was at Frederick Idetermined, as soon as it should be drivenout of Maryland, to issue a Proclamation of
Emancipation such as I thought most likely tobe useful. I said nothing to anyone; but I madethe promise to myself, and (hesitating a little)—to my Maker. The rebel army is now driven out,and I am going to fulfill that promise."
That was the background of the greatEmancipation Proclamation which freed the slavesfor the first time in this country.
In the remainder of the chapter, beginning withVerse 30, we find the specific commitments thatthese Israelites made. I would like to summarizethem for you first and then we will look at them alittle closer. There are six of them:
First, they committed themselves to avoid theunequal yoke in their marriages. Second, theypromised to observe anew the seventh day (theSabbath), and the seventh year, (the Sabbatical).Third, they promised to provide money, grain andanimals for the offerings of the temple. Fourth, theypromised to bring the first fruits of their crops,their herds, their flocks, and their firstborn sons, toGod. Fifth, they promised to pay ten per cent (thetithe,) of all their income, their crops and wealth tothe temple. Sixth, they promised to attend faithfullythe house of God.
Now let us look in more detail at thesecommitments. First, their promise to avoid theunequal yoke.
We promise not to give our daughters inmarriage to the peoples around us or take theirdaughters for our sons. (Nehemiah 10:30 NIV)
That may look discriminatory, but there is anexcellent reason for that. The peoples among whomIsrael was called to live were unusually degenerate.They practiced public lewdness. They worshippedsexual organs. Their immorality had spread diseasesamong their people. They killed their children bythrowing them alive into furnaces of fire in worshipto their god, Molech. To protect the Israelites fromthese dangerous practices God had told themnot to intermarry with these peoples. Thoughintermarriage might look right and proper to us, itwould introduce into Israel attitudes and conceptsthat would ultimately undermine their faith anddestroy them and their nation. This is what actuallyhappened. Though Solomon, David’s own son,was said to be the wisest man who ever lived, henevertheless contracted over a thousand marriageswith foreign women, who brought their gods with
THE NEW RESOLVENEHEMIAH – LESSON 10
them and eventually introduced pagan practicesinto the worship of Israel. By the time Solomon’sson came to the throne, the nation was so dividedthey could no longer exist as one but were separatedinto two. So this was a very wise pledge to make.
What we are concerned about, of course, is thepractical application of this to us. This commandis actually repeated in Paul’s second letter to theCorinthians, not concerning racial distinctions,but religious. He says, "Do not be yoked togetherwith unbelievers, for what does a believer have incommon with an unbeliever, or what agreementis there between the temple of God and idols?" (2Corinthians 6:14-16). Many Christians have ignoredthat to their own detriment by intermarrying withothers of a different faith. They have thereby soundermined their own faith that evil in many wayshas ultimately crept in and destroyed their marriages.Now there is no guarantee that if you marry aChristian you are going to have a happy marriagebecause there are other principles involved. But itis much more likely to happen because there areprinciples and practices taught to us in the Wordthat make for happiness in marriage. It is certainthat if you disobey this command, however, youare opening the door to much heartache, struggleand misery. There are passages designed to helppeople who have already done that for God isvery practical and merciful. He recognizes that forvarious reasons intermarriage may occur. There areguidelines to help handle those situations. But byand large this is practical wisdom that needs to beadhered to today. Marry those who share the samefaith you have, because faith is the basis for all oflife.
The second thing the Israelites promised is toobserve the seventh day and the seventh year.
When the neighboring peoples bringmerchandise or grain to sell on the Sabbath, wewill not buy from them on the Sabbath or onany holy day. Every seventh year we will forgoworking the land and will cancel all debts.(Nehemiah 10:31 NIV)
This is a rather amazing commandment.God had said, "Six days shall you labor but onthe seventh day you shall rest." The seventh dayis Saturday, not Sunday. In the last century manyChristians mistakenly carried the restrictions of theSabbath over into Sunday. They even called Sundaythe Sabbath. If you have seen the movie "Chariotsof Fire" you know that that is a central
factor in thatstory. But Sunday is not the Sabbath. Sunday is theLord’s Day. It is a day for rejoicing, witness, rest andcelebration. It still preserves the idea of rest for thebody. The Sabbath and the seventh year are botha picture of rest. What God is teaching us is thatwe need rest in the midst of our activity. It is stillan easily demonstrated fact that if you do not restperiodically your body will begin to deteriorate.You cannot maintain health by constant activity. Weneed a repeated period of rest. So the seventh day isstill a very wise thing to observe. But spiritually it isa picture for us of learning to rest in God at work.The Sabbath followed the pattern of creation. In sixdays God created the heavens and the earth and onthe seventh day he rested. He no longer created.He stopped working. There is a wonderful versein Hebrews that says, "He that enters into rest hasceased from his own work even as God did fromhis" (Hebrews 4:10).
What this wonderful visual aid from the OldTestament this teaching is: We are to work. We areto make decisions. We are to act. We are to makechoices. But we must not forget that our activitywill never be enough to accomplish what we hopeto achieve. It cannot do it by itself. God must be atwork in it as well. He will back up our labor anduse it in ways that we could never anticipate. That iswhat this verse describes. We do not have to worryabout doing it all ourselves. We are to do what wecan do and then expect God to use that. This is therepeated lesson of Scripture all the way throughthe Old and New Testament alike. God will takeour simple effort and use it in ways we could neverimagine. That is the story of the feeding of the fivethousand. God took a boy’s simple lunch of loavesand fishes and, as Jesus prayed over it and blessed it,multiplied it until it fed five thousand people. Thatis the picture of one who rests in the working ofGod. That is the teaching of the seventh day.
But the seventh year teaches us to rest in thesupply of God. God promises to supply his people’sneeds. We see this in the 25th chapter of the book ofLeviticus where the LORD says to Israel:
"Follow my decrees and be careful to obey mylaws, and you will live safely in the land. Thenthe land will yield its fruit, and you will eat yourfill and live there in safety. You mayask, 'Whatwill we eat in the seventh year if we do not plantor harvest our crops?' I will send you such a
THE NEW RESOLVENEHEMIAH – LESSON 10
blessing in the sixth year that the land will yieldenough for three years. While you plant duringthe eighth year, you will eat from the old cropand will continue to eat from it until the harvestof the ninth year comes in." (Leviticus 25:18-22NIV)
Again, that is God’s way of teaching his peoplethat we cannot do enough to supply all our needs,but he can and will. One of the great lessons taughtto us again and again is that God will supply.
I remember as a boy reading the thrillingstory of Hudson Taylor. That enterprising youngmissionary went out to China and threw asidetraditional approaches to the native population andbegan to preach and teach. He learned great lessonsabout God’s ability to supply. Eventually he cameup with what has become a perpetual slogan of theChina Inland Missionary, now called the OverseasMissionary Fellowship. It is: "God’s work done inGod’s way will never lack God’s supply."
Peninsula Bible Church has tried to operateon that basis through all its years, and we can saywith great thanksgiving, it is true. God supplies ourneeds if we are careful to see that the work is donein his way.
I recall how excited I was a few years ago whenwe were planning the first Congress on BiblicalExposition. We needed a huge amount of money.It was in the early days of our planning when wehad not developed any kind of a support list. Werealized that unless we came up with at least$200,000 in cash within a week the work would fallapart and we could not go on. We would have tocancel our meeting and close out our effort. Severalof us gathered at Mount Hermon and set this beforethe Lord. We said, "This is your work. If you wantit to succeed, you must supply." At a meeting thatnight, although we never made any mention ofmoney, to my great astonishment and thanksgiving,I was handed a check for $50,000! Others began tocall in and by the end of the evening we had thepromise of $200,000 in cash. This was God’s supply.This is what he is teaching us: that we are not leftto our own efforts. It is not up to us to do all theplanning, programming and arranging and tosupply everything. That is what the world believes.But our God is a God of supply. That is what thesabbatical year means.
The third thing they undertook was to providethe money, the grain and the animals for thesacrificial offerings.
"We assume the responsibility for carrying outthe commands to give a third of a shekel eachyear for the service of the house of our God: forthe bread set out on the table; for the regulargrain offerings and burnt offerings; for theofferings on the Sabbaths, New Moon festivalsand appointed feasts; for the holy offerings; forsin offerings to make atonement for Israel; andfor all the duties of the house of our God.
We — the priests, the Levites and the people —have cast lots to determine when each of ourfamilies is to bring to the house of our God atset times each year a contribution of wood toburn on the altar of the LORD our God, as itis written in the Law. (Nehemiah 10:32-34 NIV)
They recognized the need for offerings andsacrifices, and that they had to continue from yearto year. The history of Israel clearly reveals that theprimary character of this nation was an emphasison shedding the blood of animals and offering uptheir crops and grain to God. By so doing they werenever allowed to forget the cost of redemption.Blood shed means a death has occurred. God isteaching his people that their problem with sinwithin was of such a serious nature it cannot besolved by merely instructing the mind. Only deathcan cure it.
These bloody offerings prepared the way for thedeath of Jesus and even our remembrance of thatdeath at the Lord’s Table. We ought to meditate onthis every day. We should never allow ourselves toforget the cost of our redemption. It took all thatGod had to open a door that we might return tohim. As Peter put it, "We are not redeemed withcorruptible things, such as silver and gold, but withthe precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb withoutblemish and without spot," (1 Peter 1:18-19).
The fourth thing, and very closely related to theforegoing, was the promise of these people to bringthe firstfruits of their crops, herds, flocks, and eventheir sons to God.